What is The Day of Common Learning?
The Day of Common Learning, also known as The Day of Courageous Conversations, is an opportunity for IWU-Marion faculty, staff, and students to participate in campus wide-dialogue on ways our Christian community can better, with more intentionality, engage in perspectives of the “other.” Through way of conference-like proposal submissions with resulting sessions and panels, this day boldly invites our community to partake in simultaneous teaching and learning paradigms that center on themes such as power, privilege, identity, reconciliation, belonging, among other pertinent topics. This year, Courageous Conversations, will take place on Tuesday, Feb. 11th.
This year’s Day of Courageous Conversations draws attention to the theme of belonging and becoming. Do you fit at IWU? What does “fit” mean? Where do you feel you belong most on campus? Are you happy with the person you’re becoming? Is there a disconnect between your sense of belonging and becoming? Have you ever reached out and asked these same questions of others, or do you view your own belonging and becoming as isolated? In many instances, belonging precedes belief, and we inevitably become what we believe. Jesus taught that belonging and becoming are not mutually exclusive. They are natural to both our social experiences as well as our spiritual development. On this day, we hope these sessions offer new and renewed revelations about Jesus, His teachings about belonging and becoming, and help us all (re)consider our role and responsibility in helping others find their belonging in God’s Kingdom, even as they struggle alongside us to become the people God desires them to be.
For more information about IWU’s beliefs in growing as a diverse learning community, visit www.indwes.edu/about/diversity/. You can learn more about the different Diversity Events that IWU offers here.
About the Writer
Dr. Joel Olufowote is the Executive Director for Inclusive Excellence on the residential campus of Indiana Wesleyan University and associate professor of political science in the Division of Social Sciences and Business. Olufowote oversees the Office of Intercultural Learning and Engagement, the central residential hub dedicated to creating and maintaining student belonging, purpose, and thriving through the institutional pursuit of inclusive academic and co-curricular excellence. Most currently, Olufowote is a 2019 National Inclusive Excellence Leadership Academy Fellow, 2019 State of Indiana Achievement in Education Awardee, awarded by current Indiana Governor Eric Holcomb.
